Facebook Commits Its Social Power To Find Missing Children

01/14/15

Written By:

Janet Burns

With Facebook's announced partnership, a new type of government agency will use the site's expansive reach to alert communities about missing children

First established in the U.S. as emergency broadcast system announcements for locating abducted children, AMBER Alert has expanded to numerous countries and utilizes email, billboards, traffic displays, text messages and other alert methods. Now, social media has joined the list of tech mediums supporting the program.

On January 13, a date recognized as National AMBER Alert Awareness Day, Facebook’s Trust and Safety Manager Emily Vacher announced that Facebook will henceforth support location-targeted alerts from the agency. “We know the chances of finding a missing child increase when more people are on the lookout, especially in the critical first hours,” Vacher stated in a press release. “Our goal is to help get these alerts out quickly to the people who are in the best position to help.”

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